An exclusive excerpt from the forthcoming coffee-table book on the Reference 57260

Over the past eight years, Vacheron Constantin, the oldest watch manufacturer in the world, has been working to create an intriguing new timepiece, the Reference 57260, which features a staggering 57 complications, or functions, a significant achievement for a mechanical watch.

Developed by a team of master craftsmen, the double-dial pocket watch combines the classic principles of watchmaking with modern innovations, many of which are entirely new.

Now a beautiful new coffee-table book reveals the near-obsessive craftsmanship behind the new timepiece, complete with detailed photography. Here is an exclusive excerpt:

Reference 57260 is a masterpiece of unimaginable complication and technical innovation, one that looks at least as far into the future as it looks back into the past for inspiration. It is a celebration of human ingenuity, technical mastery, and, yes, life itself, with its beating mechanical heart.

Conceived, developed, manufactured, prototyped, finished, and assembled over a breathtaking period of eight years by a team of three of VacheronConstantin's master watchmakers, this all-encompassing study of the past, present, and future of horology is stamped with the prestigious Hallmark of Geneva.